I really wouldn't rank her in the top 10 P4P. Mainly because average male fighters would run through her with very little resistance and also the level of competition she fights is a much lower standard than that of all the others on the P4P lists.

She'd without doubt be top of the womens P4P rankings but nowhere near the mens. Also why would anyone mix genders when talking about P4P rankings?

I really wouldn't rank her in the top 10 P4P. Mainly because average male fighters would run through her with very little resistance and also the level of competition she fights is a much lower standard than that of all the others on the P4P lists.

She'd without doubt be top of the womens P4P rankings but nowhere near the mens. Also why would anyone mix genders when talking about P4P rankings?

I really wouldn't rank her in the top 10 P4P. Mainly because average male fighters would run through her with very little resistance and also the level of competition she fights is a much lower standard than that of all the others on the P4P lists.

She'd without doubt be top of the womens P4P rankings but nowhere near the mens. Also why would anyone mix genders when talking about P4P rankings?

I really wouldn't rank her in the top 10 P4P. Mainly because average male fighters would run through her with very little resistance and also the level of competition she fights is a much lower standard than that of all the others on the P4P lists.

But you can use that same argument against pound-for-pound rankings too. We use "P4P" precisely we already suspect that Jose Aldo and Dominick Cruz would lose to Pat Barry or Gabriel Gonzaga, and that it wouldn't be a reasonable test of their abilities - or even entertaining to watch - to have them fight in an open-weight competition. A gender-neutral overall ranking is no less valid than a size-neutral overall ranking is. The real issue in such a list would be the quality of opponent that the fighters have defeated (which is part of our "pound-for-pound" lists, usually).

Fight Matrix chooses to separate men from women, even in their "Division Dominance" rankings, but if you combined their two lists, it would look like this:

In my experience, no one would ever interpret this list as meaning that Fight Matrix believes GSP would defeat Cain Velasquez, or Jose Aldo would beat Jon Jones. Saying that Marloes Coenen shouldn't be in this list because she wouldn't likely defeat Jose Aldo is equally pointless, imo, because she would never be expected to.

Last edited 5/15/11 11:05AM server time by AchillesHeelEdit note/reason: n/a

I really wouldn't rank her in the top 10 P4P. Mainly because average male fighters would run through her with very little resistance and also the level of competition she fights is a much lower standard than that of all the others on the P4P lists.

But you can use that same argument against pound-for-pound rankings too. We use "P4P" precisely we already suspect that Jose Aldo and Dominick Cruz would lose to Pat Barry or Gabriel Gonzaga, and that it wouldn't be a reasonable test of their abilities - or even entertaining to watch - to have them fight in an open-weight competition. A gender-neutral overall ranking is no less valid than a size-neutral overall ranking is. The real issue in such a list would be the quality of opponent that the fighters have defeated (which is part of our "pound-for-pound" lists, usually).

Fight Matrix chooses to separate men from women, even in their "Division Dominance" rankings, but if you combined their two lists, it would look like this:

In my experience, no one would ever interpret this list as meaning that Fight Matrix believes GSP would defeat Cain Velasquez, or Jose Aldo would beat Jon Jones. Saying that Marloes Coenen shouldn't be in this list because she wouldn't likely defeat Jose Aldo is equally pointless, imo, because she would never be expected to.

I really wouldn't rank her in the top 10 P4P. Mainly because average male fighters would run through her with very little resistance and also the level of competition she fights is a much lower standard than that of all the others on the P4P lists.

But you can use that same argument against pound-for-pound rankings too. We use "P4P" precisely we already suspect that Jose Aldo and Dominick Cruz would lose to Pat Barry or Gabriel Gonzaga, and that it wouldn't be a reasonable test of their abilities - or even entertaining to watch - to have them fight in an open-weight competition. A gender-neutral overall ranking is no less valid than a size-neutral overall ranking is. The real issue in such a list would be the quality of opponent that the fighters have defeated (which is part of our "pound-for-pound" lists, usually).

Fight Matrix chooses to separate men from women, even in their "Division Dominance" rankings, but if you combined their two lists, it would look like this:

In my experience, no one would ever interpret this list as meaning that Fight Matrix believes GSP would defeat Cain Velasquez, or Jose Aldo would beat Jon Jones. Saying that Marloes Coenen shouldn't be in this list because she wouldn't likely defeat Jose Aldo is equally pointless, imo, because she would never be expected to.

All of that reasoning instantly flies out the window if you compare her to 145 pound fighters. You make a point that "x" fighter being ranked above "y" doesn't mean that they would win in a fight and use examples of welterweights fighting heavyweights. The reason their p4p ranking isn't an indication of who would win the fight is because they're in different weight classes.

The logic you've used applies to fighters fighting with severe weight disadvantages, not to fighters within the same weight class. If you make the same comparison of p4p rankings of fighters who share the same weight class your logic is no longer relevant. GSP (#2) WOULD be expected to beat Fitch (#8) or Shields (#9), because they're the same size. The lack of disparity in weight removes any inability to compare them directly.

Basically you've reasoned that since something is true given situation A it must also be true given situation B which contains an entirely different set of parameters. This doesn't make sense.

If we're assuming that women are on a level playing field with men (which is what ranking them together implies) then a female 145 pound fighter should be directly comparable to a male 145 pound fighter. Even fighters who are not on anyone's p4p lists like Joe Warren would completely annihilate her.

The assertion that combining FightMatrix's p4p lists would result in what you wrote also doesn't make sense. Since rankings are relative you can't just smush the lists together and assume that nothing will change. The very fact that they were being ranked within a much deeper talent pool and against many more fighters would alter their ranking significantly, since they would be compared to a different group of people than they had been previously.

A ranking system is something that can be applied to any level of competition, but the competitors are compared to others who are at the same level of competition. For example in strategy games like starcraft 2 there are ladder rankings and divisions. You can get 2000 points in bronze league or 2000 points in master league, but they are not directly comparable. The math for calculating how many points a given competitor gets is the same across all divisions, but the fact that you are being compared against a significantly more skilled talent pool means that these point totals are in NO WAY equal.

The same reasoning applies to Fightmatrix's p4p rankings. They have a mathematical formula which compares certain fighters against one another. You could have a backyard MMA match with your friends and apply FightMatrix's formula. Someone could achieve the same "divisional dominance" because they're being compared at a way lower level, but there's no way that if you beat up all of your friends and calculated your divisional dominance within your backyard fighting league to be as high as GSP's is within HIS ladder that you could then directly compare your ranking to FightMatrix's Men's rankings.

If we're assuming that women are on a level playing field with men (which is what ranking them together implies)

No, it doesn't. My point about the weight classes is that we don't assume that the men are on a level playing field with each other. Quite the opposite, in fact. We use a "pound-for-pound" list precisely because we agree that an open-weight ranking would be silly. We shouldn't be evaluating any fighter based on how they would fare against an opponent they would never be expected to fight in the first place. I think we should use that same rule of thumb for comparing women to men. We don't have 255-lb guys fight 155-lb guys, therefore we shouldn't judge the lightweights based on how they would do against heavyweights. We don't have women fight men in MMA, therefore we shouldn't judge the women based on how they would do against men (or the reverse either, for that matter).

Posted by Aether

The assertion that combining FightMatrix's p4p lists would result in what you wrote also doesn't make sense. Since rankings are relative you can't just smush the lists together and assume that nothing will change. The very fact that they were being ranked within a much deeper talent pool and against many more fighters would alter their ranking significantly, since they would be compared to a different group of people than they had been previously.

Fight Matrix is very protective of their scoring system, but they claim that it takes strength-of-competition into account. And even though they won't tell us the details of their scoring system, we can see that strength-of-competition matters somehow: Brock Lesnar, at only 5-2, has a higher score than Cole Konrad and Daniel Cormier, who are both 7-0. If the quality of Lesnar's opponents weren't a factor, there's no way he could be ranked higher than guys who have just as many fights and have never been defeated.

Posted by Aether

A ranking system is something that can be applied to any level of competition,

Not strictly true, in this case. In order to have a Fight Matrix score, the person needs to have had a sanctioned, professional fight.

Posted by Aether

The same reasoning applies to Fightmatrix's p4p rankings.

For clarity, Fight Matrix's "Division Dominance" isn't exactly the same as most pound-for-pound lists. In a way, it's a better effort to remove weight class as a factor.

"Division dominance" they write, "is comparable to a pound-for-pound list, but does not factor in the theoretical or 'proven' ability to transcend weight divisions while remaining successful."

Posted by Aether

Someone could achieve the same "divisional dominance" because they're being compared at a way lower level, but there's no way that if you beat up all of your friends and calculated your divisional dominance within your backyard fighting league to be as high as GSP's is within HIS ladder that you could then directly compare your ranking to FightMatrix's Men's rankings.

This isn't true. If I competed in a backyard tournament with my friends, I would have no Fight Matrix score whatsoever. So that's right out. Furthermore, and more importantly, if I went and fought in whatever sanctioned, low-level professional tournament would have me, my resulting Fight Matrix score would be comparable to GSP's. His score is 194; at a guess, mine would probably be about 0 (because I doubt that I would win a pro fight at any level ).

So back to the main point: A pound-for-pound list is decidedly not a ranking of who we think would defeat whom, should they meet in the cage. We all agree on this. We do not evaluate fighters based on how they would actually perform against opponents they would never be asked to perform against.

If MMA were to become gender-integrated, then yes, we would have to rank women against men in terms of real outcomes, just as lightweights would have to be judged against heavyweights in an open-weight tournament. But I'm guessing that some of the people who don't want to rank women with men in a single list are also people who would never want women actually fighting men. Just as I have no problem with separating 155-lb men from 255-lb men, I have no problem with separating men from women; and just as I think there's something to be said for ranking Frank Edgar ahead of Matt Mitrione, I think there's something to be said for ranking Christiane Santos ahead of Matt Mitrione.

I'm sorry but your logic is flawed. I'm not trying to be rude, but you're making connections that aren't there and interpreting statements in really strange ways.

I'll take just two examples:

1."A ranking system is something that can be applied to any level of competition,

Not strictly true, in this case. In order to have a Fight Matrix score, the person needs to have had a sanctioned, professional fight. "

I didn't say that Fight Matrix would put it up on their webpage, I said that you can take the system that they use for ranking fighters, and apply those formulas to any level or group of fighter. Whether FightMatrix actually tells people or not is irrelevant, it's hypothetical, we're not discussing whether your fake fighting league would actually be ranked on fightmatrix.com. The point is that the system for ranking people can be applied exactly the same to entirely different groups of people independently of one another. The fact that there is a separate list for men and women's p4p proves this.

2."This isn't true. If I competed in a backyard tournament with my friends, I would have no Fight Matrix score whatsoever. So that's right out."

Again, this makes no sense. If you knew whatever the formula happens to be for this particular ranking system, what would prevent you from applying it to your imaginary fighting league? You can take the mathematics of a scoring system and apply them to different groups of people. Again, the very fact that they have done it separately for Men and Women proves this, and the reason they are separate is because the formula has been used on 2 different groups of people completely independent of one another. It's a mathematical formula, you just plug in the variables and it will work exactly the same for you as it does for everyone else, whether you're doing it or the people at fightmatrix are doing, it the formula will be the same and will produce similar numbers no matter what group you apply it to.

You're misinterpreting the vast majority of what I wrote. I would have to write far too much to go through each example, so I guess we'll just have to agree to disagree.

That's funny, I was going to say the same thing to you. You're fixating on my citation of Fight Matrix scores, when that was only meant to be illustrative of my larger point. I think a separate discussion of Fight Matrix's scoring system would be cool to have, but it would be off-topic to have it here. I'm taking them at their word that their system normalizes for weight class and accounts for the fighter's level of competition, but if you don't want to - and if I don't want to defend them - then I shouldn't have introduced it.

I think I summed up my central point the best here...

Posted by AchillesHeel

We don't have 255-lb guys fight 155-lb guys, therefore we shouldn't judge the lightweights based on how they would do against heavyweights. We [also] don't have women fight men in MMA, therefore we shouldn't judge the women based on how they would do against men.

...and here:

Posted by AchillesHeel

Just as I have no problem with separating 155-lb men from 255-lb men [in real fights], I have no problem with separating men from women; and just as I think there's something to be said for ranking Frank Edgar ahead of Matt Mitrione [in a theoretical ranking system], I think there's something to be said for ranking Christiane Santos ahead of Matt Mitrione.